Tomb Raider

João says:

Ok, this is a first.
But to be honest, it’s a first only in the blog, because in the real world it happens a few times. 😜

Jasmine and I do not agree with each other about this movie, she is not happy with it to say it lightly and I, well I believe its a good start for something more.

But let’s go into my opinion and then we can see her point and then decide I am right together, just kidding…. or am I.

Ok so before going into the movie lets talk a bit about the history of “Tomb Raider” because I think it will explain a lot of my position on the film.

“Tomb Raider” started as a video game in 1996, it was one of the first games to show a girl as the main character, and more than that, this character was awesome, she could climb, jump, shoot guns and be smarter than any “Indiana Jones” out there.

But being honest there was also the fact that she was very sexy that helped this game become a huge hit.

Still, there was something a bit different from other action games like this, maybe because it was a female character they felt the need to cut on the violence, on the first game she hardly kills anyone.

But times changed and the games become more and more a mix of “Indiana Jones” and “James Bond”.
She was an action hero that in many ways was indestructible and fearless.
At least for me, that made the games more fun but the character less engaging and relatable.
In 2001 the dream of many men become a reality, Lara came to life in a live-action movie, and who else could play her?Angelina Jolie, she was the exact copy of the character many of us fell in love, physically she was impressive and just like Lara.

But her personality was also just like the game, at no point she ever looked like she was in danger, she felt robotic.
This for me was the problem; I want to see a character that is in a struggle, that is brave because it faces its fears.

In 2013 at least for me I got what I wanted, Lara gets rebooted in the video games, we see a Lara before she becomes this fantastic hero, we get to see a character that is flawed, and that doesn’t know everything, and we get to see her grow.
I believe this movie did that same thing very well, The first 20m of this movie for me is flawless and inspiring, we see a broken Lara.

In every turn we get a wake-up call that this is not a character that knows it all, she will not win every fight, and she will be knocked down.
She is fast on a bike, she is smart and fearless, but she is not unstoppable and has baggage that still holds her back, she will not face guys with knives, she will run, but she will not back down.
She is all of us and what many of us want to be, and for me, she is one of the strongest female characters I ever saw on screen.

I do agree with Jasmine on some of the things;
It drives me mad when characters that are ordinary human beings go through situations that no one would ever survive, and this movie has a few things like that.
But at the same time, in this movie, they show her so many times failing and getting hurt that I give it a pass.

Let’s talk about the main reason I believe this movie works, Alicia Vikander, she is awesome.
I always knew that she could bring something outstanding to this movie, she is an Oscar-winning actress, but it was her portrayal of Ava in “Ex Machina” that made me be blown away by her.

She was able to make me believe.
Believe that she would never give up on her dad, would never sign that paper even if it would mean that she would struggle financially.
She made me believe that she was scared, wasn’t prepared to face all the challenges given to her but she would face everything head on.

The other piece of the puzzle for this movie to work is the visuals and directing, having cool visuals sometimes is not enough, you need to know what to do with them.Roar Uthaug knows how to direct action with visuals, if you never saw “The wave” give it a look, it’s impressive what he does with a tiny budget.
The action is incredible and slick, how its filmed feels just like the video game, keeps you on the edge of your seat as it should.

But it’s not all perfect; there are many things I didn’t like, things that could be much better and that I hope will be fixed, and a sequel is made, there is enough to take it forward.

To start the script could have been much better, in many ways this felt like a bad ripoff of “Raiders of the lost ark” if there is anything “Black Panther” taught us this year is that action is cool, but character development is the key.

Second, they had Walton Goggins playing a bad villain, and I mean bad not in a good way if you saw his work before you know that is a hard thing to do, and two different movies did it this year, yes I am looking at you “Maze runner: The death cure.”
I was hoping for allot more of him, I was digging this tired and out of connection with society villain, how he felt half-asleep killing people as he wasn’t even awake, but I needed the character to arc to show his motivations, and he never did.

One other thing that needs to improve is the challenges that Lara faces, one of the biggest things in the game is the puzzles.
On the movie, one of the big “puzzles” or challenges was a pit that she had to put a stair across a hole and walk over it.
NOOOOO, that is not a challenge for this kind of icon action adventures character to face, I was expecting more.

The last thing that didn’t ruin the movie but I hope doesn’t ruin the sequel was the ending and setup for the next film.
As she finds the connection between the Croft company with the big evil organization pulling strings, not everything needs to be elaborated and explain, Indiana was cool because we had the Nazis, we knew they were bad, and that was it.

So for me, it takes a bit more points home because in some ways it took risks, and I see potential there.
Still, I believe Jasmine has some fair points, just not on the character being week.

And before we go into Jasmine’s opinion, I have one more bone to pick;

I want to talk to every movie marketing company out there.

I know you want to sell the movie, but don’t pick up easter eggs that are at the end of the film and put it in the trailer, NOOOOO.
Keep us wondering, don’t show everything, “Tomb Raider” even had awesome trailers that didn’t need that stupid joke.

Jasmine says:

First of all, I would like to say, that this movie did not live up to the standard Angelina Jolie had set out. I didn’t really enjoy this movie because it was very unbelievable.
A normal human being would have died in most of the situations that she just seemed to live through easily.

My father, however, doesn’t agree with me, he loves the parts I hate.
The visuals and the plot are brilliant and cool but still not to save the movie.

So here we go…

The first things I love about this movie is the relationship between the father and Lara Croft; the relationship between them was so strong that it brought them back together.

How he knew his daughter well enough to leave her clues to a secret compartment that only her would find.

The way she wouldn’t sign the papers cause there was a possibility that he was alive.
She couldn’t sign the contract because it meant her father was dead, meaning she had given up on him.

The last thing I love about the movie is that the ‘monster’ was actually sacrificing herself so that the world would have a life, not death.
That she knew that the world was hell for everyone because she made it like that, so she saved the world by locking herself away by choice to save the millions of lives, this touches once more on a message I love and live my life by, “Never judge a book by its cover.”

Now onto the things, I hate about this movie.

At the start of this movie, Lara Croft is shown as a character who is kind of weak and loses a fight against a few girls.
Then later on in the rest of the movie she fights people and does the impossible.

Talking about impossible. SHE IS HUMAN! NOT IMMORTAL! No one can live through that ship crash. Nearly falling off the wing of the plane and flying down the waterfall in a ripped parachute against all those trees.
Getting a dirty nail stabbed into her hip and not getting an infection, then boulders and rocks falling on top of her. BUT GUESS WHAT? SHE STILL LIVES!

But my dad thinks it is not weird that she can’t fight one woman at the beginning but then can fight about 20 men and live through all this life or death situations.

It just doesn’t make sense!

But that’s my opinion.

Watch the movie and tell us whose side you’re on because this is a war of the opinions. Forget Civil War!